Comparison of the Turkish and the Finnish Municipal Solid Waste Management Systems With a Regard to Waste to Energy Possibilities in Turkey

Abstract

This thesis represents a comparison of Turkey’s and Finland’s municipal solid waste management systems in order to provide pathways to improve Turkish municipal solid waste management system and to provide information on it. Comparison of municipal solid waste management systems was conducted under the categories of legislation, finance, collection, transport and treatment of municipal solid waste, and the performance of municipal solid waste management systems. It was found that the current Turkish municipal solid waste management system is not in line with the European Union standards. The main reasons behind this include the inadequacy of legislation surrounding the finance of municipal solid waste management system, the predominance of landfilling, the lack of source separation and mismanagement. The study also provided waste to energy scenarios for Turkey. According to these scenarios, 4,2 to 4,9 TWh of electricity per year can be theoretically generated from the co-combustion of Turkish municipal solid waste with coal addition while using only the waste collected from the five biggest cities. These amounts are equal to 5% and 5,8% of the renewable electricity generation in Turkey in 2015. Additionally, 22,1 Mt CO2 eq. of greenhouse gas emissions can be avoided.